Gimp is nice, but the one thing that drives me nuts is that everything floats around in front of each other, often hiding the main window and forcing me to minimize all open windows until I find the one floating window that I am looking for.

I'd like to have the floating windows docked along the edges of that main window, the way practically every other application works. I know this floating thing is one of the things that make Gimp special, but it's not the kind of "special" that I like... I don't have a huge screen, so it quickly gets too cramped. And I often use Gimp briefly, multitasking with other apps, so the many Gimp windows are annoying.

How can I make Gimp run in one window, with everything else inside it?

This is Gimp 2.6.11 -- just because that's what came with my Ubuntu 11.10 installation.

Just tried this on 11.10 (same as OP) and I get 'CAUTION! This PPA could break your installed OS. There are dependency issues for Oneiric Ocelot (11.10). Only use it if you know what you do!' No thanks, is there a better way to do this?
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Tom BrossmanMay 15 '12 at 18:34

2

"Otto Kesselgulasch"? Is that for real? Is that the official source?
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Torben Gundtofte-BruunMay 15 '12 at 18:46

1

I had an error upgrading GIMP as instructed. However, I solved this: I uninstalled GIMP, and then reinstalled successfully.
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Paddy LandauMay 22 '12 at 9:48

There is an unofficial application to use Gimp 2.x in a single window mode called GIMPBox.

You can find all the info with installation guide about it here. It seems a bit complicated to install, but you will have a single window Gimp 2.6.

Personally, I would suggest you install Gimp 2.8. It's a stable release so there should be nothing to worry about. I use it too and the single window mode is awesome!
Simply follow the instructions espectalll123 has given to install it and you are good to go.

@CristianaNicolae It seems like GIMPBox is only compiled for Ubuntu lucid, maverick, natty and oneiric. So precise (your version of Ubuntu) isn't supported. I would recommend you install the newest version of Gimp for single window mode (how you do it is written in the accepted answer to this question).
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rearlightNov 8 '13 at 10:25